To help launch the Notebook, we’re holding a giveaway contest!

1. Giveaway Prizes:
The first 200 italki members who complete the participation requirements will receive a free SpeakENG Sampler!

2. What you have to do:
To qualify for the Giveaway, you have to submit at least four (4) qualifying notebook entries in the Learning English section. Each notebook entry must be at least 50 words in length, and it has to be for the purpose of improving your English. You can write about language learning, culture, history, sports, literature, music, business, etc. Obscene, inflammatory, or plagiarized Notebook entries are not acceptable and will be deleted.

3. Giveaway Dates:
The Giveaway will begin on April 22nd, 2010 0:01 GMT. The deadline for eligible notebook entries is May 22nd, 2010 23:59 GMT.

4. Selection of Winners:
At the conclusion of the Giveaway, italki will award 200 SpeakENG Samplers to the first 200 italki members who have met all of the requirements. italki has sole discretion in determining which notebook entries qualify. Winners will be announced within 1 week of the end of the Giveaway, and winners will receive their prizes within 3 days of this announcement.

Click here to write a notebook entry!

Good luck and best wishes from the italki team!

* italki reserves all rights related to this promotion.
* Prizes awarded cannot be converted into cash or ITC.

SpeakENG Online Courses have been designed to help people learn English anywhere with an internet connection. The content for SpeakENG’s Online Courses are based on Pearson’s English Language Learning and Instruction System (ELLIS). Every SpeakENG Online Course also comes with a 15-minute live tutoring session with an American certified professional teacher.

As before, you can purchase additional time with SpeakENG teachers or purchase a one-year subscription to SpeakENG that includes all Online Course levels. If you’re not sure which level is right for you, or are interested in getting an assessment level test of your English, we recommend looking at the SpeakENG Sampler.

italki is trying to find a price for learning a language that is accessible to everybody around the world. SpeakENG Online Courses use the same content that is being offered at much higher prices from expensive offline English training institutes.

As always, let us know through your feedback how we can improve italki and its partnership products.

The italki team

• English Level Assessment Test
• Access to the first lesson of every level of SpeakENG Online Courses

The English Level Assessment Test

The English Level Assessment Test is an adaptive online test that comprehensively assesses your English level. You’ll get scored on your grammar understanding, listening comprehension, reading comprehension, and more. Since the test is adaptive, everybody who takes the test will see a different set of questions. Your test scores also correlate with an equivalent TOEFL and TOEIC score, which should be helpful if you are planning to take those exams.

Access to the first lesson of every level of SpeakENG Online Courses

The SpeakENG Sampler will get you access to the first lesson of every SpeakENG Online Course. This will give you an idea of the range of exercises and content that you’ll be exposed to in SpeakENG. In general, there are 15-20 lessons per full SpeakENG Online Course. If you’re not sure which level to purchase, the Sampler can ensure you choose the right level.

We think this is great choice for English learners that are new to the world of SpeakENG. You can get an objective assessment of your English level, as well as a direct view into what SpeakENG courses would be the best fit for you.

View the SpeakENG Sampler.
View the list of SpeakENG Online Courses.

The italki team

For Students – Give Yourself the Joy of Learning and Get a Bonus

When you buy 200 or more ITC in a single purchase during the month of December, italki will give you 10% bonus on that purchase.  This applies to each and every single purchase of 200 or more italki credits you make during the month of December.  So that means, Buy 200 ITC and you will receive a total of 220.  Buy 300 ITC and you will receive 330, and so on.  If you haven’t bought ITC yet or tried finding a teacher online, now’s the time to start! More learning, more lessons, more time with a teacher to improve your foreign language skills.

For Learners of English – Give the Joy of Learning English to a Friend

When you buy the 1-year SpeakENG multimedia course, you can give the same 1-year package to a friend for free!  The SpeakENG 1 year course gives you full access to the premier online teaching program from our Marketplace Partner Eleutian.  Also included is one 15-minute videoconference with one of Eleutian’s American certified ESL teachers. Give a friend a gift this holiday season and let him or her learn English too!  Please provide the person’s email address when purchasing this package.

For Teachers – Bring the Joy of Learning to New Students

No Commission on New Students:  For all *new* students you start teaching during the month of December, italki will waive its commission for those students. That means extra money in your pocket. That is, any students you’ve never taught before (for paid sessions) that begin lessons with you during December, there will be no commission on all of those lessons.  We highly encourage teachers to look for new students and try to get some lessons taught throughout the month of December.

These promotions are not exclusive and may be combined.  Promotions lasts from December 1, 2009 12:01AM until December 31, 2009 11:59PM China Time (GMT+8).

Congratulations to these members who’ve won a 1-month subscription to the SpeakENG course.

Eucilene     Brazil
Amanda     Brazil
Yingshine     China
Lucinda     China
Tony Feng     China
Lucky     China
Ahmed Elrazki     Egypt
Hery     Indonesia
Joy     China/Japan
Hamahamacchi     Japan
Queen Bees     Lebanon
CINTHYA     Peru
Ugly     Russia
Firuz     Tajikistan
Nao     Japan/USA
Sharanya India
Ozan Turkey
Sarah Iraq
Hasan Bangladesh

Winners should claim their prize by the 28th of September and then will have one month to use it.  Good luck to all the winners!  We have high hopes for your improved English ability and we look forward to hearing from you after you use this package.

For those of you who didn’t win, you can still buy the SpeakENG Online Course for either 1 year or 1 month.  Don’t forget the special introductory price of $16 for the 1-year course will be ending September 30.  So make sure you take advantage of the reduced rate and buy before the end of the month!

So this is your last chance to purchase the 1-Year SpeakENG Online Course for $16 USD!

If you know anyone who is studying English, please tell them to join italki and purchase it soon! The price for the same package starting in October will be $40 USD! Don’t miss out on this great opportunity!

If you don’t know much about the SpeakENG Online Course, you can read the description here. It’s important to remember that SpeakENG has two main parts:
1) Online Course: Multimedia lessons, English exercises, grammar explanations, roleplaying games, and much more. The courses run from beginner levels to advanced.
2) One-on-One Tutoring with a professional American teacher: Included with the 1-year online course is a 15 minute session with a professional US teacher. The teacher can answer any questions the student may have, in addition to structuring a one-on-one live teaching course. Students are encouraged to purchase additional teaching sessions.

Here is a sample video of what a SpeakENG online course looks like:

You can also view a short sample of a one-on-one tutoring session here.

We hope people studying English will take advantage of this promotional pricing! It is really a tremendous value that is hard to compare with.

Also, it’s the last chance to register for our sweepstakes the Great English Giveaway. We’re giving away 20 SpeakENG 1-month Online Courses, and all you have to do is post in that group. We’ll be choosing the winners on Monday. Go post now, and if you don’t win next week — make sure you purchase SpeakENG by the end of the month!

The italki team

SpeakENG is an online course for learning English, and any italki member can win a 1-Month Subscription just by replying to this group post! The SpeakENG program includes access to the Online Course for a full month, plus a 15 minute session with Eleutian’s certified ESL teachers.

—————————————————————————————————

What you need to do to enter the sweepstakes:

1) Log on to italki.com or join if you’re not already a member.

2) Go to The Great English Giveaway group post

3) Read the rules, and then reply to the post with three things:

• How you found out about italki
• Why you’re learning English
• A funny or embarrassing English mistake you have made

4) That’s it!

The contest will begin on September 8, 2009 at 12:01 am China Standard Time, and will end on September 20, 2009 at 11:59 pm China Standard Time.  italki will choose the winner before September 30th.  Full contest details are available here.

If you’re looking for other products to help you learn English, check out the italki Marketplace.

Good luck!

Alipay

Learning English is the primary goal of most users on italki, which is natural given that the majority of users are not native speakers of English. Our largest group of users come from China (20% of total users). We’ve just started a marketing partnership with Alipay to make it easier for Chinese users to purchase italki credits.
Alipay is a payment platform owned by the global e-commerce company Alibaba. Alipay works similarly to Paypal, and is very popular in China. For the month of August, we are offering a 10% bonus to purchases of italki credits over $30 USD through Alipay.

Learning English in China

Alipay - italki page

We hope that by making it easier for Chinese users to pay online, this will lead to more transactions on the italki marketplace. There is certainly an immense demand for learning English in China. Chinese students start learning English at an early age (depends regionally, but average age of 10-13). However, after studying English for five years or more, many students graduate with “哑巴英文” (mute English). They often have not had any opportunity to use their English, and the vast majority are taught by Chinese teachers with varying levels of proficiency.

Given the demand for English, English training centers in China are a huge industry. These centers often are very expensive (10,000 – 20,000 RMB or ~$1500-$3000 USD). This amount of money also needs to be viewed in an economic context where the average monthly salary is roughly between $200 – $600 USD (depends on the city and region).

Anecdotally, we’ve been told that many Chinese find their experiences at these teaching centers to be disappointing. The centers are strong at marketing, but weak at delivering real improvement for students. Students have very limited access to teachers and are stuck listening in large classes.

Naturally, we believe that online learning can change this equation radically. italki partners, like Eleutian, can deliver an online product (SpeakENG), direct to students at an incredibly low costs. Students can get Eleutian’s certified teachers or find independent teachers which they can schedule according to their own time needs. In addition, student tuition doesn’t go into supporting building rents in expensive city districts, massive marketing campaigns, or large school administrations. Given the natural benefits of online learning, we think this will become a major alternative to offline learning in the near future.

View the English press release (PDF)
View the Chinese press release (PDF)

The italki Team

Eleutian is based in Wyoming, USA, in a little town called Ten Sleep (google map).  Their mission is to teach the world English, using online courses and US-based teachers.  In a time when much of the US is in recession, Eleutian has been hiring certified teachers to satisfy the global demand for learning English.  Eleutian is an interesting globalization story in that English teaching is being “in-sourced” to the US. Another intriguing aspect about Eleutian is its surprising technology infrastructure (news report).

click for detailed explanation page of SpeakENG

The other part of Eleutian’s SpeakENG product is online courses that are powered by Pearson’s English Language Learning and Instruction System (ELLIS).  SpeakENG (Pearson ELLIS) has an impressive amount of English content for online self-study. There are video lessons, scripts, recordings, skill drills, in-depth explanations of grammar points, and much more.  We’ve been told the package normally retails at a very expensive rate, and that the pricing on italki reflects Eleutian’s desire to grow aggressively in this market (this pricing might not last).

If you want to find out more information (pictures and walkthrough), take a look at our in-depth explanation on Eleutian SpeakENG.

Eleutian SpeakENG is offering to italki users:

• 8- minute trial tutoring session – $1.50
• 1 month subscription to SpeakENG with 15-minute tutoring session – $6.00
• 1 year subscription to SpeakENG with 15-minute tutoring session – $16.00
• 4 x 15-minute tutoring sessions – $20.00
• 24 x 15-minute tutoring sesions – $110.00

You can see the full list here.

If you’re learning English, we really can’t recommend trying SpeakENG enough. It’s an amazing product for self-study and combined with tutoring from US certified teachers, we’re sure this is something that you shouldn’t miss out on.

View the press release (PDF)

The italki Team

Our first partner company, Eleutian Technology, targets the largest language learning market in the world: Learning English.  Eleutian uses American certified-school teachers and the highly-regarded Pearson English Language Learning Instruction System (ELLIS) to teach English online.

click to go to marketplace

Language Learning Ecosystem

Our plan is to expand the marketplace to include every language, and to support a variety of services.  By creating an ecosystem for language learning, we believe everyone benefits:  students, independent teachers, language training companies, and application developers.

Students benefit by having more choices.  They can pay for premium services, or use the free community generated ones.  Students are able to share information about different service providers and make informed choices.  Students are also able to pick and choose a combination of services that may be useful to them.  Most of all, a central location helps students find online providers of language education.

Teachers and companies benefit by having an active market with demand for their service.  Companies and teachers can reach out to students around the world, and transact without having to deal with individual payment issues.  Quality teachers and companies also benefit by having their reputation socially confirmed by their customers.

Again, we’re thrilled to be opening our expanded marketplace, and to have Eleutian join us as our first partner.  If you’re not learning English, just be patient — we’re planning to add more companies and services for other languages soon. If you represent a company that might be interested in partnering with italki, please contact us at business at italki dot com.

View the press release （PDF)

The italki Team